Brought to you by the NCKP Committee for The Creative Pianist: Leila Viss, Chair, Bradley Sowash, Forrest Kinney.

Wednesday, July 29

1:30-2:00 Pre-Conference Keynote Address (Grand Ballroom EF)

2:15-2:30 Plenary Orientation: Chew on This(Magnolia A)

Directions on how the day will be packaged. There's a large assortment of ways to teach creativity at the keys so we've narrowed it down to a few golden nuggets that will immediately enhance your playing and your teaching.

Like a box of chocolates with no printed guide, one of the biggest challenges beginning improvisers face is interpreting the chord symbols found in pop/jazz/rock lead sheets and chord charts. Learn about the variations found in contemporary chord nomenclature and then sample some sweet progressions specifically designed to foster chord fluency.

Composer, performer, multi-instrumentalist and educator Bradley Sowash is known for his creative music-making instructional books published by Kjos Music and as the co-founder of 88 Creative Keys improvisation camps for piano students and teachers.

The Flavors and Styles of Chords (Foundations of Arranging) -Magnolia C (Dark Chocolate group)Learn a simple system for playing and teaching add-2 chords and various 7th chords all the way up to 13th chords as you taste the distinct flavor of each chord along the way. Some are sweet, some are bitter! Then learn to play these chords in various basic styles to create both arrangements for popular melodies and foundations for improvisations.

Forrest Kinney, NCTM, is the author and composer of 19 books including the Pattern Play series on improvisation, the Chord Play series on arranging, and Creativity—Beyond Compare. He is a pianist who regularly gives concerts and presentations for music educators. His arrangements are now in over 40 publications.

So you can already play the melody and chord symbols found in lead sheets…now what? You can have your cake and eat it too! Grab a handful of tricks and treats used by professional keyboard improvisers. Learn to help your students sweeten their tunes by embellishing melodies while you improvise duets using "stock" accompaniments.

Composer, performer, multi-instrumentalist and educator Bradley Sowash is known for his creative music-making instructional books published by Kjos Music and as the co-founder of 88 Creative Keys improvisation camps for piano students and teachers.

Learn how you can help all your students become able to “talk with tones” and enjoy it. At the keyboard, we will explore approaches and techniques that help students get a successful start in a duet setting before gradually learning to play solo. The focus will be on learning in such a way that musical ideas are not stuck in our heads but flow intuitively into our hands.

Forrest Kinney, NCTM, is the author and composer of 19 books including the Pattern Play series on improvisation, the Chord Play series on arranging, and Creativity—Beyond Compare. He is a pianist who regularly gives concerts and presentations for music educators. His arrangements are now in over 40 publications.